A Letter from the Museum of the City of NY to The Puffin Foundation, Ltd.

July 19, 2013

MCNY 1220 Fifth Avenue at 103rd Street
mcny.org

Dear Gladys and Perry,

On behalf of the Board of Trustees and staff of the Museum of the City of New York, I most heartily thank you for the Puffin Foundation’s gifts and your generous pledge for the Puffin Foundation Gallery endowment. You have been so extraordinarily generous to this institution, and I am tremendously grateful for your visionary support of the gallery, which has contributed so greatly to the Museum’s mission and service to the public.

From professional development workshops for NYC teachers, to field trips serving tens of thousands of public school children each year, to gallery talks and public programs, the Puffin Foundation Gallery is a vital center, illuminating an aspect of the city’s history that is key to its identity. The Foundation’s generous gifts toward an endowment ensure that the gallery will continue to educate New Yorkers and visitors from across the globe for generations to come.

Sincerely,
Susan Henshaw Jones
Ronay Menschel Director

Activist New York is the inaugural exhibition in The Puffin Foundation Gallery, which is dedicated to the ways in which ordinary New Yorkers have exercised their power to shape the city’s and the nation’s future.

Activist New York explores the drama of social activism in New York City from the 17th century right up to the present. In a town renowned for its in-your-face persona, citizens of the city have banded together on issues as diverse as historic preservation, civil rights, wages, sexual orientation, and religious freedom. Using artifacts, photographs, audio and visual presentations, as well as interactive components that seek to tell the entire story of activism in the five boroughs, Activist New York presents the passions and conflicts that underlie the city’s history of agitation.